PUYA
Union (MCA)
Reviewed by DJ Johnson

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I'm hearing a lot of bitching about this CD. Bitching from critics, mostly, though I imagine some 13 year olds who can only relate to power chords are ticked. Everybody loves to stand a band against a wall, tell 'em to say cheese and hit a chord and then plasti- cast them, forever entombing their sound. Hell, it's easier to write about a band when you can use your last review as a template. Well screw them all. Puya's new CD, Union, still has sounds as heavy as the rock of Gibralter, with guitars riffing away while tuned down ala Tony Iommi and drums pounding relentlessly, but right in the middle of this blast furnace there will be a parting of branches and fronds revealing an island path. The Puerto Rican band started down that path on their 1999 debut, Fundamental, though they sure didn't play their roots music quite so authentically. There are times that the Latin music plays long enough to lull the listener into forgetting this is Puya and that if they kick back too close to the speakers they're gonna get hurt. This is definitely an English language album, so the radio programmers have no excuses this time, except the usual "we're just plain too lame to program any peg that doesn't fit in one of these three or four prefabricated holes" bit. Program this stuff. I just want to see what kind of reaction a single tune that goes from crunching metal with angry bear singer to island festival and back might get.

© 2001 - DJ Johnson